A recent report highlighted that the millennials have taken over baby boomers as America’s largest generation. Unsurprisingly, brands are focusing their marketing and customer experience strategies on millennials that naturally form a significant portion of the user base in every industry. But what’s so different about millennials that calls for so much customization?

First, the millennial generation can be called as the first truly technology native generation that has seen the emergence and application of most modern technologies. They have seen the evolution of the internet, social media, AI, and much more. Naturally, they respect innovation and prefer brands that regularly offer new products or services and don’t shy away from using emerging technologies.

The millennials have also been instrumental in shaping the world as we know it. They know they have a voice and want to make sure that it is heard, stressing the importance of customized and real-time interactions through live chat software and other engagement tools that enable dynamic and predictive customer service.

But what happens when you can’t meet the expectations of your millennial user base? Honestly, you may have a lot at stake as millennials believe in sharing their bad experiences. A Gallup report indicates that millennials have the lowest overall customer engagement score compared to other generations, opening a window of opportunity for firms to grow their user base by fine-tuning their CX for the millennials.

5 Ways to Improve Your Customer Experience for the Millennials

Millennials are comfortable with technology but value human touch. They like to search for information online but are often skeptical about what they see. Therefore, brands must use a clever mix of technology and human touch for the millennial user base to boost conversions and forge loyal brand relationships.

Here are five tips to improve your CX to meet the expectations of your millennial customers:

1. Build an Intuitive Onboarding Program

First things first – millennials value their time and money, and it falls upon you to make sure they can derive the promised benefits from your product or service in the least possible time. This calls for a seamless and simple onboarding program that guides as well as delights users.

Remember, a well-planned onboarding plan solves two significant problems for churn: users don’t understand your product or don’t get the promised results. By designing a laser-sharp onboarding program that is simple yet effective, you can capture the millennials’ attention by delivering maximum value for their time and ensuring some great word of mouth advertising for your brand.

But where do you start?

A well-written welcome email is a good start. It sets the right tone for future conversations by thanking users for their purchase and assuring them of continued support. Next, you may prepare an in-app greeting or a second email that shares a short video onboarding tutorial to simplify the set-up. However, it is best to keep the video optional, as some users may want to skip or revisit it later. You can also create an empty state and use UI markers to guide customers around your site or app. It may also be a good idea to fix a video call or a co-browsing session for an in-depth demonstration, depending on your product’s nature.

2. Provide Real-Time Support With Live Chat Software

Speed and efficiency are the cornerstones of a good customer experience. Unfortunately, most brands fail to deliver on these aspects as customers wait for hours, or even days, to have their queries addressed on phone and email. Live chat cuts through the clutter by connecting users with customer service representatives instantly. Besides, live chat can be initiated on any device, making it genuinely omnichannel – something that millennials greatly value.

Live chat enables real-time connections and facilitates multitasking. This is good for both your agents and customers, who can do more in their limited time. Modern live chat software can also be integrated with your CRM to effect a higher degree of personalization and grow your customer information database seamlessly.

HLC, a leading bicycle distributor in North America, has implemented live chat to improve support and seen great results in other areas like employee onboarding and product development. The company uses live chat as a seamless support method for users who often sit in front of their computers to solve an issue. Live chat enables these users to hit a button and connect with someone instantly to get a resolution. The brand also uses cobrowsing to guide customers on their web screen using features like pointing, clicking, scrolling and highlighting.

The software used by HLC also allows chat tagging, which enables the company to tag live chat conversations with tags like product, freight, and warranty to solve such issues proactively. The results are spectacular, with the company reporting a live chat response rate of 97%, improved operational visibility, and faster employee onboarding.

3. Enable Self-Service with Knowledgebase

According to data, up to 70% of customers prefer to use a company’s website to resolve their queries rather than phone or email.

According to another report, 51% of users prefer technical support through a knowledge base, which is interactive and easy to use.

The reason is simple – self-service is faster, and there’s also an associated sense of satisfaction. Therefore, a well-designed knowledge base can improve user experience through instant query resolution, saving time for both you and the customers. In addition, your knowledge base also improves your SEO, leading to increased visibility for your website.

If you are building a knowledge base, make sure that it is easy to find and not hidden behind customer support tickets. Also, your knowledge base must be appropriately organized and easily searchable. You may also include auto-filling options to make it easier for users to find the information they need.

4. Focus on Omnichannel over Multichannel

Millennials use multiple channels to connect with brands, making it pertinent to adopt an omnichannel approach for optimal customer experience. Data indicates that customers may switch up to six devices before completing an online purchase. Besides, millennials are known to switch between “laptops, smartphones, and TV on an average of 27 times per hour.”

And, just like they consume content across multiple devices, the millennials also expect the same level of support across all these devices and channels – highlighting the importance of omnichannel experience across all devices and platforms like social media, email, voice, or chat support.

5. Use Chatbots for Personalization

Consumers are using AI more and more and have become more positive about using chatbots over time. Especially users from Gen Z and the Millennial generation are comfortable with chatbots and agree that chatbots make the query resolution process faster and more efficient. The observation is not surprising as chatbots gel perfectly with millennial expectations, such as:

• Instant gratification
• Increased convenience
• Chance to engage with emerging technologies
• Personalized engagement

The last point, personalized engagement, is quite important as users don’t want to be treated like numbers and expect brands to anticipate their needs and fulfill them proactively. Chatbots can meet this demand by analyzing thousands of data points about every customer to generate accurate behavioral insights and predict buying patterns to make relevant recommendations and offers. In addition, bots can automate your customer support and also pre-qualify leads to improve overall organizational efficiency.

Conclusion

Millennials form a large part of the user base for any brand. Yes, they are not the only generation of customers that businesses must focus on. Still, they represent a growing user base with substantial purchasing power and the ability to influence other consumers with their opinions and ideas.

The five customer experience tips that we shared in this post will not only help you meet the demands of your millennial customers better but also improve your overall experience for better results. If you have any tips or ideas you’d like to share, do comment in the section below. We’d love to hear your thoughts.

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